


girl of wire (and the boy who bled)

by you_guys_are_losers (courting_insanity)



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies), The Hunger Games (Movies)
Genre: F/M, Gore, Graphic depictions of violence - Freeform, Grief, Hunger Games AU, Major character death - Freeform, Mental Illness, Murder, PTSD, Trauma, Violence, enemies (?) to lovers
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-11
Updated: 2020-08-11
Packaged: 2021-03-06 02:08:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,220
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25835524
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/courting_insanity/pseuds/you_guys_are_losers
Summary: The odds are never in their favor.
Relationships: Michelle Jones & Peter Parker, Michelle Jones/Peter Parker
Comments: 35
Kudos: 24





	girl of wire (and the boy who bled)

**Author's Note:**

> //Hi! I know I've been radio silent for a while and I have other WIPs in progress, but the plan is for this to be a short fic that flashes through the chronology of the games. I've got a lot of it completed, but I wanted to post this as a teaser while I finish and polish the rest up. When it drops, it'll be all at once and when you least expect it, so until then... 
> 
> May the odds be never in your favor. ;)

District Three is burning.

Ned tastes the smoke on the wind as he sprints toward the Factory District. The ash is distinct from the smoggy air of the industrial center, and it nearly masks the sweat and fear rising from the bodies that press against him. A warehouse to his left is smoldering. Several stragglers try to douse the flames as Ned shoves his way through the crowd, their faces set into grim masks of calm as they combat the flames with water fetched by several young workers. Ned knows they will join the rest of the crowd when they finish; whether they will seek shelter or join the shouts of the rioters remains to be seen.

Another round of gunfire echoes through the narrow streets as Ned rounds a corner. The shouting increases to compete with the cracking of firearms, an enraged battle cry that ricochets off of factory and warehouse walls. It fades as Ned works his way further into the Forest. The streets are emptier here, where the first seeds of uprising took root. Deserted manufacturing plants line the walkways and remind Ned of a ghost town.

Maybe, if the Capitol has its way, it will be.

The eerie silence of the Forest has nothing for Ned. After following the grid for several blocks, he takes a sharp left into the communal housing where many of the factory workers live. An explosion rattles the ground, shattering windows on the faces of the buildings. Ned does not slow for an instant. He knows his path, and he is no more capable of deserting it than a homing missile is its target.

A splintered wooden doorway, a groaning metal staircase. The obstacles to Ned’s destination drift by, dreamlike, until he stands before a cracked door. His heart wrenches as Ned considers the possibility that they forced it open, but a voice drifts to him from inside to eliminate the fear.

“Is that you, honey?”

Ned’s tightening chest wages war with the wave of relief that courses through him. He wants to laugh, or maybe cry, but there isn’t time. He pushes open the door, not shutting it as he enters the Parker residence.

It looks precisely as he remembers, even in the stirring embers of a revolution. The room is just large enough for Ned to stand up straight, and the walls are thin enough to discourage him from resting his shoulder against them to give his weary legs a rest. The wood of the furniture slumps with age. A pair of blankets partially covers a mattress in the center of the floor, but no indentation suggests anyone has slept there. Orange, flickering light pierces through dirty windows in a few spots where there are missing panes.

May Parker stares through one of these gaps in the glass. She does not react to Ned’s presence; she does not even look away from the slit that overlooks the industrial buildings.

“It’s me, May,” Ned murmurs, taking a step towards her. The urgency that carried him here vanishes as he sees her. Even in the poor illumination of the flaming city below, Ned can see that she is worse. Her shoulders slump as she peers out the window, and her hair is in the same matted bun she wore when Ned came to visit her yesterday. The bread and canned vegetables he left her are untouched on the windowsill. Her eyes are glassy and unseeing, fixed on a point out the window that Ned is too far away to identify.

“Peter?”

The name, tumbling from her chapped lips, brings an aching knot to the front of Ned’s throat. It takes all of Ned’s strength to speak through it. “No, May.” He purses his lips to stop them from trembling. “It’s Ned. Remember?”

May doesn’t answer, though she hums as she shifts her weight. She tips forward so suddenly and carelessly that Ned is afraid she is trying to pitch herself through the window. Ned rushes to her side in an instant. It is only after his arm wraps around her back that Ned realizes the real aim of the movement: to adjust her position so she can have a better view through the glass. He follows her stare to the wall of the factory opposite the residential building.

The face is so realistic that it seems to press against the glass. Ned can’t breathe.

His best friend stares at him from the face of the manufacturing plant. Peter Parker’s eyes burn into Ned’s stare, the same deep, soulful eyes that cloud over in the woman's face beside him. Black spray paint on faded brick captures Peter’s every angle. A cut gapes below the likeness’s cheekbone, and sweat beads his forehead. The hair hangs lank and tangled over his brow.

His lips pull into a smile, lopsided and accepting. The contrast between Peter’s tranquil expression and his battered appearance twists Ned’s stomach into a knot.

“We have to go, May.” May does not move. Ned didn’t expect her to. “They’re coming.”

As if summoned by Ned’s warning, another round of shots fires in the distance. May raises a trembling hand to touch the glass. “He’s coming back for me, you know,” she informs Ned in a voice of total calm. “He promised.”

“I know he did.” Ned sees the Peacekeepers in the street. A handful of figures clad in white, segmented armor turn the corner, forcing open the doors of warehouses and housing units. He watches them disappear into an empty electric plant for a moment, only to emerge moments later with their guns brandished.

“You’re all I have, you know.” May’s misty gaze drifts to Ned for the first time since he entered the room, and though it finds him, Ned knows she isn’t really seeing. Her hand rises to his cheek. “What did I do to deserve you, kiddo?”

Ned doesn’t answer. The sound of boots on a metal staircase drifts up through the thin walls.

“Everything.” The word is raw in his throat as Ned tightens his grip around her back, shifting May so he stands between her and the door. His hands tremble, but his voice doesn’t. “You gave everything.”

The filmy mist in May’s eyes clears as she furrows her brow, pursing her lips. “Peter?” The heavy footsteps pound in the outside hallway. Ned can feel the vibrations in the floorboards beneath them. “What are you...”

_ “Please.”  _ Peter’s plea echoes in Ned’s mind as screams drift through the patchy glass of the window.  _ “Please. Don’t leave her.” _

Ned grasps May’s hands, holding them tight. His eyes drift to the missing pane behind May. A flickering monitor faces the apartments, and the screen cuts away from colored bars to the blurry face of a girl with wild twists of dark hair. Even through the smoke and pixels, her haunted brown gaze cuts him to the bone.

Ned clenches his jaw. “I’m keeping a promise.”

The door bursts open, and Ned pulls May to him. Maybe he will not be enough to shield her. Maybe the bullets will rip him to shreds, peppering the mattress and the paper-thin walls and shattering what remains of the window. Maybe the bodies in the streets will do nothing to change centuries of injustice and oppression.

But May Parker will not die alone.


End file.
